| Digital Audio has only reviewer that I seriously dislike. He belongs
to the schools of "Classical Music for People that don't like Classical
Music" and "It can't be any good if the composer hasn't been dead
for about 50 years". He also "seems" to be a bit sexist. The worst
part is that he owns the magazine.
There are a few notes in this conference that have the keyword
REVIEW attached to them. A "DIR/KEYWORD=REVIEW" will get you that
list of notes. Some of the semi-regular reviewers will take
requests. Some of the regular note writers show pretty clear
musical preferences in their opinions, so you might send them
mail to ask for a review. The worst they can do is impolitely
say bug off.
If you have specific disk you are interested in, you want to
do a title or keyword search first, to see if it has already
been mentioned. If not, just ask and somebody will probably
answer.
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I was a charter subscriber to the mag. Apparently there's alot of
people in the New Hamster/Massychewsets area that don't think highly
of Wayne Green (Editor/Publisher) of CD&DAR. I believe it's probably
because he started many hi-tech publications that panned alot of
what was considered "leading-edge" technology, writing many of the
"reviews" himself. So much for Wayne - and I do agree with .-1,
in that his classical reviews do leave much to be desired and his
supposed belief that "the only good composer is a dead one," has
been criticized many times by readers.
The magazine itself is generally fair, and the reviews are written
by some staff and some regular readers and even a celeb guest or
two (i.e.; Rod McKuen critiqued Barbra Streisand's Broadway Album).
They are biased, but the sound/performance graphs are generally
pretty close to being accurate. All in all, I like it and use the
reviews only if they relate to artists and/or music I like. Rarely
do I let one of their reviews sell me something I wouldn't otherwise
buy. I've been burned to badly by buying stuff reviewed as great
by Rolling Stone magazine. The Ken Pohl articles are usually
interesting (he's an equipment reviewer, formerly of Stereo Review
and others), and the letters to the Ed are usually funny and really
informative. It's cheap enough, so I have continued my subscription
since its' inception.
The Cruiser
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| I was a charter subscriber to Digital Audio as well and just let my
subscription lapse. The main reason for doing this is that the
hardware and software reviews were turning my stomach.
Note: The CD reviews were much better than the players.
Back when the magazine first started up, the reviews were
quite good. However, as with all Wayne Green publications they
start off good and go down hill from there. As a result it got
to a point that I couldn't stomach the hi-tech hype anymore and
decided to spend my money elsewhere.
Steve
BTW if you let your subscription lapse, Wayne sends you "personal"
letters at a rate of about 1 per week for almost 3 months. It then
backs off to about 1 per month asking you to re-subscribe. Note
that the price is still the same. (Some magazines drop the price
if you hold out long enough).
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